The FA Centre of Refereeing Excellence

o text in field]

FA Centre of Refereeing Excellence (CORE) is an emerging and exciting refereeing structure.

The FA CORE aims to provide an identified number of referees at a variety of levels with quality training, education and development opportunities delivered both centrally and across a number of regional locations.

FA CORE is for those referees who demonstrate that they have the clear potential and opportunity to progress in refereeing regardless of which part of the country they are from, their gender or their age.

Referees involved in FA CORE at all levels must always possess (among other aspects) the appropriate levels of:

Focus and Commitment

Enthusiasm to progress

Developing on-field performances

Off-field attitude

Professionalism

Fitness

Referees will benefit from a season long programme where The FA will provide them with a trained, motivated and accredited referee coach who will be the point of contact throughout their time on FA CORE at that specific tier of the structure.

There will be five tiers of the FA CORE programme which will provide training, education, development and coaching for Referees from level 7 to level 2b.

FA CORE will be delivered primarily through eight regions.

Overseeing each regional centre and their associated 'Referees and Coaching Workforce' will be an FA CORE centre leader. This person will be the link person to The FA's Head of Refereeing, Neale Barry, and National Referee Development Manager, Daniel Meeson.

While The FA will have overall responsibility for the performance coaches and referees within each of the regions, much of the work carried out should be supported, overseen and ‘quality’ checked by the centre leader on a regular basis.

Continued learning

ofa referees academy

We're committed to the development of new referees and our Referee Academy is just one of the ways we try to achieve this.

The Academy operates in conjunction with the Oxford United FC (OUFC) Centre of Excellence (CoE) which plays games in the Under 9 to Under 15 age groups every Sunday throughout the season at the Oxford Community School in Cowley.